Hello everyone. I am moving to Puerto Rico this summer 2019 for work. I am employed for the government and will work at Fort Buchanan. We are a family of five with three younger children. I am looking for recommendations on locales to live based upon commuting time, safety, quality of life, and access to consumer goods/ services. I have a budget of $3500/ month for rental and could even purchase, but probably don't want to assume the risk of an uncertain housing market. I would live in PR for two to three years. Schools are not important because we will homeschool unless we decide to utilize a private school (to be determined based upon finances).
1. We love the beach and near-ocean front seems ideal, especially if amenities are included.
2. My wife is crazy for CrossFit so we need a location that offers these types of activities.
3. I'm willing to commute up to one hour (Fort Buchanan)
4. We prefer a community with some expats.
5. We have our own household goods so do not require furnished— however, we could make furnished work.
6. Prefer a single family home but open to resort style living. It would be new to us.
PS- i haven't thought about living near the mountains so perhaps you can convince me...
Based on these factors, Where should we look for houses and why?
My other question is about what vehicles I should bring. We have big American cars— a huge F150 4x4 and a super long Denali 4x4. We used to live in Germany and these type of vehicles would have been really impractical there due to parking and other things. What's the situation with PR? I can sell them both and bring something much smaller but, of course, we live our current cars.
Thank you all in advance!